


maps and mazes

by somethingdifferent



Category: Fringe
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-19
Updated: 2014-05-19
Packaged: 2018-01-25 19:23:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1659650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/somethingdifferent/pseuds/somethingdifferent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>something no one ever mentions:</em>
  <br/><em>most life on this earth is unremarkable</em>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>These are the things that make and break a man.</p>
            </blockquote>





	maps and mazes

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

> _ Once there were brook trout in the streams in the mountains. You could see them standing in the amber current where the white edges of their fins wimpled softly in the flow. They smelled of moss in your hand. Polished and muscular and torsional. On their backs were vermiculate patterns that were maps of the world in its becoming.  _ Maps and mazes. _ Of a thing which could not be put back. Not be made right again. In the deep glens where they lived all things were older than man and they hummed of mystery. _
> 
>  
> 
> Cormac McCarthy

 

 

 

 

 

 

10.

Dying is not so terrible as he was led to believe. He has lived so long and traveled so far. He has been so very tired.

It is almost a relief to close his eyes.

 

 

 

6.

He wishes (and this is a childish thing, he has not wished for anything in many, many years) he could paint. It is a useless skill, he has thought so for a long time. He understands the appeal, of course. The broad sweeping lines on the canvas, the radiance of the oil, the shape forming from nothingness into - something more.

But August has never liked artists much, he finds them flighty and too often irresponsible. So often they want to die more than they want to live. He has seen many die who want so badly to live. He has never found it fair.

Still, he finds himself wishing he could paint. He could learn, he supposes. He spends his time waiting for things, waiting for things to happen, to take shape, to fall from the sky or burrow into the earth. He has time. Much more than others are allotted. He has all the time in the world.

He wishes he could paint, and yet he does nothing about it, because if he could paint he would paint her, most likely. And he must not leave a trace. This is what you do. He knows this. He does not leave a trace, save for a few photographs he allows himself to look at, sometimes. When he needs it. When she crosses his mind.

(when does she not cross his mind?)

He does not paint, though he wishes he could. Like the old masters. Immortalize his subject in marble and oil. Give her a name. Make a museum around. Build cities in her likeness. Countries. The earth people walk over.

Important. And safe.

 

 

 

3.

People die. He knows this. People die, and such a thing is unavoidable.

(so many things are called unavoidable)

Disease, accidents, murder, disaster, both natural and unnatural. He's seen them all too often.

Why would anyone choose death? he asks September, once. A man has just committed suicide in the face on an Event. They had watched it happen, the two of them, and August is suddenly curious.

(that always was his problem)

I  do not understand why someone would do this.

The other man, if he can be labeled as such, inclines his head, considering. It is not in our nature to understand, he finally replies. Maybe in time.

 

 

 

5.

She goes to museums often. The Museum of Fine Arts, mostly. She has lived in this city for a long time, she does not travel much. The flight to Rome would be her first time out of the country.

He has seen better collections than the ones in this museum, of course. In his line of work he has seen many many works far more beautiful. He has been to the galleries in Rome a dozen times over, the catacombs under Paris, the pyramids of Egypt, palaces in places with names Christine Hollis couldn't even pronounce. He has seen many things beyond the scope of what she could imagine is beautiful. He has seen many things.

She loves the Renaissance works the most, he can tell, Raphael and Botticelli. The one time he allows himself to go, to enter the building and look at the exhibits and look at her, she lingers the longest in the rooms with the big, sweeping frescoes, with the old Italian masters. He has seen better, of course. Of course.

He does not understand why he found none of the many many things quite so -

 

 

 

8.

There are plans in place. Have been for years. Humans, in their current form, have a tenuous grasp, at best, at the immensity of time, the sheer magnitude of everything that has ever happened and ever is and ever will and always is, because time happens always, even in other places. Even in every incarnation of this universe. Even here, now, this is happening over and over again, August is alive and watching the girl or August is alive and catching bullets or August is alive and orchestrating his own death. He is not human. He has been built to handle the infinity. The growth and decay and growth again. He understands the impact one single thing can have. He understands the danger of allowing something as mercurial as emotion to cloud his judgment. To bias the results. The future has been given rules and regulations and an ironclad schedule. To be followed. This person here lives. This one dies. You have one chance to make this right, make this important. You have one rule, and people don't rise from the dead. There is no Lazarus for someone like him. She dies then she dies then she dies. Nothing to it. This is the time to act. Take the girl by the arm. Catch bullets, like in a magic show. Shatter the glass. Now drive.

 

 

 

2.

He finds himself in a church. He has before, he will again, most likely. He's waiting, as he so often is, waiting for something to happen. It was not on his schedule, but he has a feeling. It pulls him toward the church anyway. He has some time before the next Event, and he's certain, absolutely certain, so he enters the church and waits.

(something no one ever mentions: 

most life on this earth is unremarkable

he eats, bathes, sleeps dreamlessly

he waits

there was nothing to stop him from veering off course)

He is sitting in the back row, away from the center aisle, just enough part of the crowd and just far enough away. He has been built to fade into backgrounds. He has always been useful in this regard.

He is not sure why he is here yet. He is certain it will become apparent soon, but as far as he can tell, it is nothing out of the ordinary. Just another funeral full to the brim of black clothes and black umbrellas and black cars lined up on the pavement like ants.

Watches the funeral. The dual coffins, side by side in death. Always together, like vines growing into the ground, planted like Baucis and Philemon. They must have loved each other, he thinks, though the word means little to him.

August waits for something to happen. He sits through the service, listens to the drone of the priest and the readings from Corinthians and the sorrowful thrum of the organ.

When he sees the little girl walking from the altar, the rest of the congregation trailing behind, he feels certain suddenly. He has seen her before, at another Event. She must be important. To have drawn him to the church, though there is nothing slated. She must be important.

He walks up the aisle, his footsteps silent against the marble tiles of the floor. She has left her toy from the bridge on one of the pews. Without thinking, he takes it. Puts it into his briefcase.

(later, he remembers this, and

perhaps they should have prepared for the chance of one of them becoming too - involved

that was always his problem, wasn't it?)

 

 

 

4.

He observes. He waits, and watches, and does not interfere. This is what he has always done.

(this is what you do: you wait and watch and do not interfere

it is not in your nature to care, so you do not care

you are not human

do not forget this)

He opens his case, gently pushing a stuffed animal out of the way to retrieve his notebook. Again, for the briefest moment, his hand stills over the toy as he considers whether now is the day to leave it behind, let another child find it in his seat at this diner booth and carry it home, useful once again.

Every time, he swallows down this hesitation, ties it up neatly in the back of his chest. Waits.

 

 

 

7.

She goes out sometimes. He knows that she does, though he does not see her often. She is a young woman, young and pretty and sociable, so it stands to reason that she would go out on occasion.

He is monitoring a new Event, waiting in the restaurant for something to collapse, and it is nothing more than an unfortunate circumstance that she is there. He had not even planned this, had not even envisioned that she would be here. He feels a pang of (what is the word? disappointment? regret?) something tug against his ribcage when he realizes that she will be here to witness this. Things that fall apart remind her often of the bridge. He always could tell.

He writes his observations in his book, carefully avoiding looking in her direction, her there just beyond his line of sight. People who see him do not often forget. He is very strange-looking, according to the general opinion of these people.

Just minutes before the Event is slated to occur, she stands, wrapping her shawl around her shoulders and smiling at her date as she walks out of the restaurant. He breathes a sigh of relief, if it can be called as such. He is (happy?) satisfied that she will not see.

He cannot resist glancing at her as she leaves. He has never had much self-control, it was what got him in this situation in the first place, so he gives himself a few seconds to just _see_ her.

She is very pretty of course. He is certain that as a child people would have always told her how beautiful she would be when she was grown. She is grown, her stylish dress and painted lips and dark hair, stark against her neck like curled metal. She is beautiful. He has seen many beautiful things and creatures, and yet none quite so...

The man she is with kisses her. August can see from the window. He is familiar with the names of things, and he does not have a name for this. He turns away to wait once again. It would not do to dwell on what he has no hope of knowing. These are the things that cause so much destruction in this world he inhabits and does not live in. These are the things that make and break a man.

(except:

he is not a man

it would not do to forget this)

 

 

 

1.

He's on a bridge. He's on a bridge, watching and waiting and writing things down. He crosses from one side to the other, back and forth, to and fro, over and over to pass the time. He does many things to pass the time, though few of them really work.

He's walking, waiting, when something tugs at the hem of his jacket. He looks down, and there is a girl. Small, with a balloon and red shoes and a little stuffed bear.

You look funny, she says, looking up.

Yes, he says in reply. Of course.

She scrunches her face, tries to flatten her features to look like his. Yes, she imitates. Of course.

She hands him the balloon (yellow, the exact color of a dandelion) and trots off to wherever she came from without so much as a word goodbye. It feels a little like he's had the wind knocked out of him, if he knew what that was actually like. He stops, leans far over the railing. Stares at the gray water and the small yellow sun glinting over the surface. Wavering against the motion of the sea.

He checks the time. It will only be a little longer.

The bridge collapses, and he watches. He records his observations. He records the velocity of several people falling to their deaths. He records the volume of the tears of a woman screaming for her son. He records the approximate size of the group of survivors. The little girl is one of them. He had not expected that.

She is crying. He is not surprised, such a situation would call for this kind of reaction. Someone has given her a blanket to wrap around her shoulders, for the shock. She will wait for it to fade, as they always do, though he knows it never will. She clings to the stuffed bear, the toy her father won for her, clings to it like she would cling to the last remnants of innocence careening from her grasp.

She is so very small against the crowd of crying people. She presses her wrists against her eyes, sets her mouth into a hard line. She looks so strong for one so little, and he is still holding the balloon she gave to him earlier. He knows how it looks, but suddenly, he doesn't have the heart to let it float away.

(he doesn't have a heart at all

he thinks)

He feels sorry, abruptly, sorry for not being able to interfere, sorry for the cold clinical observation of Events he has the power to stop, yet won't, yet can't, yet will not _ever_ , because he inhabits this place and does not live here, because that is not what he is meant to do, because he is he is he _is_.

This is not the first time something like this has happened. It will not be the last. Yet he is sorry for it anyway. Yet the bridge has collapsed and something is tugging at his ribcage. Yet there is a thread loose in the lining of his hat. Yet his hands are shaking as he writes. Yet the girl is so small, and she is crying. Yet still she is brave.

Yet -

 

 

 

9.

Do you _-_ (what is the word? believe? understand? love? none of them suit his question and none of them suit the magnitude of what she has meant to him, but she is only human, and bound by the barriers her language presents and she is _waiting_ ) _-_ trust me?

She hesitates, and August holds his breath. He does not need to do so, breathes out of little more than habit, yet he finds himself doing so anyway. Yes.

Takes her by the hand, leads her to the broken bed. Her eyes go wide, bright and uncertain and afraid. No, he reassures her. I will not hurt you. He moves back the mattress, lays her across the hard wooden frame as if he were setting down porcelain. All of his movements are sharp. Every moment counts and must not be wasted.

You need to stay here, he tells her. You will be safe here.

Wait. Her hand is on his arm. Her fingers dig into the cloth of his suit, wrinkling the crisp edges. Where are you going?

He tilts his head, considers the correct response. He does not give it.

I will be here. I will be just outside.

She is smiling. And he is trying very hard to smile back.

Okay. Her grip relaxes on his arm, then falls away.

I will be right here.

Okay.

And he is here, he thinks. Like the maps of cities, a little dot of existence, you are here. Like the maps of places Christine Hollis has never visited. Like the maps of buildings she has drawn in architecture courses. Like the maps of his insides, like the maps of his lost language, like the maps he follows from Event to Event to Event. You are here. You are here. You are always, always here.

(until you are not)

 

 

 

 


End file.
